the king, as if he were in imminent danger. Cockades, white or black,
but all of one colour, were distributed; and it is said the tricolour
was trodden under foot. In a word, the whole company was gone mad with
champagne and French sentiment, and hugged and kissed each other in
a wild frenzy. At this moment a door opened, and the king and queen,
leading the dauphin by the hand, entered, and at the sight the tumult
became boundless. Numbers flung themselves at the feet of the royal
pair, and escorted them back to their apartments.
All this was little less than madness on the part of the royal family.
They knew that the army at large was disaffected to royalty, and of
what avail were two regiments? If they really sought to escape, it
could only have been done by the utmost quiet and caution. The Flanders
regiment could have guarded them. But now the certain consequence must
be to rouse all the fury of Paris, and bring it down upon them. This
was the instant result. Paris, in alarm, cried, "To Versailles!" On
the night of the 4th of October the streets were thronged with excited
people; the National Guard were under arms everywhere, and maintained
some degree of order. On the morning of the 5th the women took up the
matter. They found no bread at the bakers', and they collected in
crowds, and determined to march to the Hôtel de Ville, and demand it
of the mayor. The women had refused to allow the men to join them,
declaring that they were not fit for the work they were going to do;
but numbers had followed them, better armed than themselves, and they
now assisted them to break open doors, where they obtained seven or
eight hundred muskets, three bags of money and two small cannon. As
they were proceeding to make a bonfire of the papers, which would
probably have burnt the whole place down, the commander of the National
Guard gave up the matter in despair; but one Stanislas Maillard,
a riding-messenger of the municipality, with more address, called
out to them to desist; that there was a much better thing to do--to
march at once to Versailles, and compel the Court to furnish bread,
and that he would be their leader. He seized a drum and beat it; the
women cried lustily, "To Versailles!" Some ran to the tower of the
Hôtel and sounded the tocsin. The bells soon began to ring out from
every steeple in Paris; the whole population was afloat; the men and
women, armed with all sorts of weapons, followed their new leader, who
had been one of the heroes of the Bastille, and he marched them to
the Champs Elysées. There he arranged his motley and ever-increasing
army: the women in a compact body in the middle, the men in front and
rear. Horses, waggons, carriages of all kinds, were seized on wherever
they were seen; some of these were harnessed to the cannon, and then
Maillard, drumming at their head, put his army in motion, and on they
went towards Versailles, stopping every carriage that they met, and
compelling even ladies to turn again and accompany them.
Meanwhile, Lafayette and Bailly, summoned by this strange news, had
hurried to the Hôtel de Ville, where they found the National Guard and
the French Guard drawn up, and demanding to be led to Versailles. The
French Guard declared that the nation had been insulted by the Flanders
regiment--the national cockade trampled on; and that they would go
and bring the king to Paris, and then all should be well. Bailly and
Lafayette attempted to reason with them; but they, and thousands upon
thousands of armed rabble again collected there, only cried, "Bread!
bread! Lead us to Versailles!" There was nothing for it but to comply;
and at length Lafayette declared that he would conduct them there. He
mounted his white horse, and this second army, about three o'clock in
the afternoon, marched in the track of the amazons who had already
reached Versailles.
"It was on foot," says Mounier, "in the mud, and under a violent storm
of rain. The Paris women intermixed with a certain number of men,
ragged and ferocious, and uttering frightful howlings. As we approached
the palace, we were taken for a desperate mob. Some of the Gardes du
Corps pricked their horses amongst us and dispersed us. It was with
difficulty that I made myself known, and equally difficult it was to
make our way into the palace. Instead of six women, I was compelled
to admit twelve. The king received them graciously, but separated
from their own raging and rioting class, the women were overcome by
the presence of the king, and Louison Chabry, a handsome young girl
of seventeen, could say nothing but the word 'Bread!' She would have
fallen on the floor, but the king caught her in his arms, embraced and
encouraged her; and this settled completely the rest of the women, who
knelt and kissed his hand. Louis assured them that he was very sorry
for them, and would do all in his power to have Paris well supplied
with bread. They then went out blessing him and all his family, and
declared to those outside that never was there so good a king. At
this the furious mob exclaimed that they had been tampered with by
the aristocrats, and were for tearing them to pieces; and, seizing
Louison, they were proceeding to hang her on a lamp-post, when some
of the Gardes du Corps, commanded by the Count de Guiche, "interfered
and rescued her." One Brunout, an artisan of Paris, and a hero of
the Bastille, having advanced so as to be separated from the women,
some of the Guard struck him with the flat of their swords. There was
an instant cry that the Guard were massacring the people; and the
National Guard of Versailles being called on to protect them, one of
them discharged a musket, and broke the arm of M. de Savonières, one
of the Life Guard. The firing on the Life Guard by the National Guard
then continued, and the Life Guard filed off, firing as they went. The
mob, now triumphant, attempted to fire two pieces of cannon, which
they turned upon the palace; but the powder was wet and would not
explode. The king, having meanwhile heard the firing, sent the Duke
of Luxembourg to order that the Guard should not fire, but retire to
the back of the palace. The mob then retired into Versailles in search
of bread, which Lecointre, a draper of the town, and commander of its
National Guard, promised to procure them from the municipality. But
the municipality had no bread to give, or took no pains to furnish it,
and the crowds, drenched with rain, sought shelter wherever they could
for the night. The women rushed again into the Hall of the Assembly,
and took possession of it without any ceremony. Soon after midnight
the roll of drums announced the arrival of Lafayette and his army.
An aide-de-camp soon after formally communicated his arrival to the
Assembly; that they had been delayed by the state of the roads; and
that Lafayette had also stopped them to administer to them an oath of
fidelity to the nation, the law, and the king; that all was orderly,
and that they had nothing to fear. Lafayette soon after confirmed
this by leading a column of the National Guard to the doors of the
Assembly, and sending in this message. The Assembly being satisfied,
adjourned till eleven o'clock the next day. Lafayette then proceeded
to the palace, where he assured the king and the royal family of the
loyalty of the Guard, and that every precaution should be taken for
tranquillity during the night. On this the king appeared to be at ease
and retired to rest. The mob attacked the palace in the night, but
Lafayette prevented an assault on the royal family, though two of the
Guard were butchered. The king during the night repeatedly sent to
inform the deputies of his intention to go to Paris.
[Illustration: THE BASTILLE.]
The Assembly had not paid him the respect to wait on him; but, at the
last moment, they passed a resolution that the Assembly was inseparable
from the person of the king, and appointed one hundred deputies to
attend him. Amongst them was Mirabeau. It was about one o'clock when
the king quitted Versailles amid a general discharge of musketry,
falsely, on this occasion, termed a _feu-de-joie_. The king and queen,
the dauphin, and the little daughter, Monsieur, the king's brother, and
Madame Elizabeth, the king's sister, went all in one great State coach.
Others of the royal household, with the ladies of honour, and the one
hundred deputies, followed in about a hundred vehicles of one kind or
other. The Mayor, Bailly, received them at the barrier of Paris, and
conducted them to the Hôtel de Ville. So soon as they had passed the
barrier, the numerous procession were joined by the whole leviathan mob
of Paris, calculated at two hundred thousand men! It was night, and the
crushing and shouting throngs prevented the royal carriage from more
than merely moving all the way from the barrier to the Place de Grève.
At the Hôtel de Ville, Moreau de St. Mery addressed the king in a long
speech, congratulating him on his happy arrival amongst his people--his
"loving children of the capital." The poor tired and dispirited king
replied that he always came with confidence amongst his people. Bailly
repeated the words in a loud tone to the people, but omitted the words
"with confidence," whereupon the queen said, with much spirit, "Sir,
add 'with confidence';" so Bailly replied, "Gentlemen, in hearing it
from the lips of the queen you are happier than if I had not made
that mistake." The king was then exhibited on the balcony to the mob,
with a huge tricolour cockade in his hat, at which sight, in French
fashion, the people hugged and kissed each other and danced for joy. It
was eleven o'clock at night before the miserable royal captives were
conducted by Lafayette to their appointed prison--for such it was, in
fact--the great palace of their ancestors, the Tuileries, which had
been uninhabited for a century, and had not been prepared for their
reception. The Assembly followed, and proceeded to work under the eyes
of the Paris commune and the people. Power was fast slipping from their
hands.
In such circumstances closed the year 1789. The intense excitement
which the rapid course of these French events had produced in England
had nearly superseded all other topics of interest. At first there
was an almost universal jubilation over this wonderful revolution.
The dreadful state of misery and oppression to which France had been
reduced; the fearful exactions; the system of popular ignorance
maintained by priestcraft; the abominable feudal insolence; the abuse
of _lettres de cachet_; and the internal obstructions of customs
and barriers between one province and another, made every friend of
freedom desirous of seeing all these swept away. The early progress
of their destruction was hailed with enthusiasm in England. Even the
retired and timid poet, Cowper sang a triumphal note on the fall of the
Bastille; but soon the bloody fury of the populace, and the domineering
character of the Assembly, which did not deign to stop at the proper
constitutional limits, began to create distrust and alarm. Amongst the
first to perceive and to denounce this work of anarchy rather than
of reform, was Burke. In common with Fox and Pitt, and many other
statesmen, he had rejoiced in the fall of the corrupt government of
France; but he soon began to perceive that the people were displaying
the same ferocious character as in all their former outbreaks. "If,"
he wrote to M. Menonville, a moderate Member of the Assembly, "any of
these horrid deeds were the acts of the rulers, what are we to think
of the armed people under such rulers? But if there be no rulers in
reality, and the chiefs are driven before the people rather than lead
them; and if the armed corps are composed of men who have no fixed
principle of obedience, and are moved only by the prevalence of some
general inclination, who can repute himself safe amongst a people so
furious and so senseless?" As he continued to gaze, he was compelled
to confess that he saw no great and wise principles of legislation
displayed by the Assembly; but that it went on destroying, without
knowing how to rebuild in a manner likely to last or to work any one
any good. The whole of the constitution-making, which annihilated
the royal power, which erected no second chamber, but absorbed all
authority into the Assembly, a mixed and heterogeneous body, he
declared to be a bungling and monstrous performance. On the other
hand, Dr. Price, Dr. Priestley, and numbers of equally enthusiastic
men, saw nothing but what was animating in the progress of the French
Revolution. "The Revolution Society," including many of the highest
names of the Whig aristocracy, which was accustomed to meet on the 5th
of November, to celebrate the anniversary of the landing of William
III., and the English Revolution of 1688, this year presented a glowing
address of congratulation to the French National Assembly, which was
carried over by Lord Stanhope and Dr. Price. Of course, they and the
address were received with great acclamation by the Assembly. The
admiration of the French Revolution spread over Britain. Clubs were
established, both in London and in the country, in sympathy with it,
and the press became very Gallican and Republican in its tone, and
there was much corresponding with admirers of the revolution in France,
especially with Thomas Paine, who had now transferred himself from
America, with a political fanatic destined to acquire considerable
attention, calling himself Anacharsis Clootz, the "orator of mankind,"
and with many others.
We must open the year 1790 by reverting to the affairs of Britain,
and of other countries having an influence on British interests. The
Parliament met on the 21st of January; and, in the course of the debate
on the Address in the Commons, Fox took the opportunity to laud the
French Revolution, and especially the soldiers for destroying the
Government which had raised them, and which they had sworn to obey.
Burke, in reply, whilst paying the highest compliments to the genius
of Fox, and expressing the value which he placed on his friendship,
endeavoured to guard the House and country against the pernicious
consequences of such an admiration as had been expressed by Fox.
He declared the conduct of the troops disgraceful; for instead of
betraying the Government, they ought to have defended it so far as to
allow of its yielding the necessary reforms. But the so-called reforms
in France, he said, were a disgrace to the nation. They had, instead
of limiting each branch of the Government for the general good and for
rational liberty, destroyed all the balances and counterpoises which
gave the State steadiness and security. They had pulled down all things
into an incongruous and ill-digested mass; they had concocted a digest
of anarchy called the Rights of Man, which would disgrace a schoolboy;
and had laid the axe to the root of all property by confiscating that
of the Church. To compare that revolution with our glorious one of
1688, he said, was next to blasphemy. They were diametrically opposed.
Ours preserved the Constitution and got rid of an arbitrary monarch;
theirs destroyed the Constitution and kept a monarch who was willing
to concede reforms, but who was left helpless. Fox replied that he had
been mistaken by his most venerated and estimable friend; that he was
no friend to anarchy and lamented the cruelties that had been practised
in France, but he considered them the natural result of the long and
terrible despotism which had produced the convulsion, and that he had
the firmest hopes that the French would yet complete their Constitution
with wisdom and moderation. Here the matter might have ended, but
Sheridan rose and uttered a grand but ill-considered eulogium on
the French Revolution, and charged Burke with being an advocate of
despotism. Burke highly resented this; he made a severe reply to
Sheridan; and instead of the benefits which he prognosticated, Burke,
with a deeper sagacity, declared that the issue of that revolution
would be not only civil war but many other wars.
The Whig party were in consternation at this sudden disruption of the
union of the heads of their party. A meeting was held on the night
of the 11th of February at Burlington House, which did not separate
till three in the morning. The result did not appear to have been very
satisfactory, and the fears of the Whigs were greatly augmented by
finding Pitt, who had hitherto praised the Revolution, now express the
great obligations of the country to Mr. Burke, for the able warning
which he had given against revolutionary principles. The king made no
secret of his abhorrence of these principles. He considered the French
Revolution as the direct result of the American one; and having come
to the conclusion that he had himself erred by too much concession,
he now censured the concessions of Louis XVI. as fraught with certain
calamity. All this boded a decided resistance to the spirit of reform
at home. There was a new schism amongst the organs of the press.
Many of the newspapers still fostered in their columns the wildest
hopes of universal advantage to the cause of liberty from the French
Revolution; but others adopted the opinions and views of Burke--and no
few of the Whig and Foxite papers were of this class. The effect of
the alarm at the wild conduct of the French was speedily seen in the
refusal to consider the repeal of the Test and Corporation Act, which
was brought forward by Fox, on behalf of the Dissenters, and a motion
for parliamentary reform, introduced by Mr. Flood. Both were strongly
opposed, on the ground that this was not the time to make any changes
whilst so riotous a spirit of change was near us, and was so warmly
admired by many of our own people. Both motions were rejected by large
majorities.
On the 31st of March Dundas introduced the Indian Budget, and soon
afterwards Pitt congratulated the country on the fact that, so far from
the American war having injured the trade or the power of Britain,
the fact was that our shipping had increased considerably more than
one-third since 1773, and we had been continually gaining strength
even during the American war, and had relieved ourselves of a load
of expense always incurred by the government of the States. This was
an admirable argument for declaring all our colonies independent, if
it meant anything; but Pitt went on seconding, and even surpassing
Dundas in the prognostications of a long peace. What such ministerial
speeches were worth was shown on the 5th of May, only a month and
five days since the prophecy of Dundas, and not three weeks since his
own prophecy, by Pitt announcing that the peace was already disturbed
with Spain. It appeared that the high prices obtained by the crews of
Captain Cook's ships, the _Discovery_ and _Resolution_, at Canton,
on his exploring voyages in the South Seas, for the ill-selected,
half-worn furs brought from the north-west coast of America, had
attracted the attention of adventurers under the direct protection
of the East India Company. Mr. Mears, who had been a lieutenant in
the royal navy, and a Mr. Tippin, were sent out in command each of
a vessel. Tippin was wrecked on the coast of Kamtschatka; but Mears
reached Prince William's Sound and wintered there, opening a good trade
with the natives. In the spring of 1788 he discovered Nootka Sound,
a fine bay on the west side of a small island on the west coast of
Vancouver's Island. There he formed a settlement, making a bargain
with the chief for it. He went to Canton with furs and was opening a
fine trade, when the Spaniards came down on the settlement, seized
four British vessels, but permitted two United States' vessels to
remain unmolested. Part of the English crew were shipped in one of the
American vessels to China, and the rest suffered to depart in one of
their own ships after it had been plundered. The Spanish commander then
settled himself in the new colony, and Spain set up a general claim to
all coasts and islands, and the whole Pacific as far as China.
Pitt, on the day mentioned, announced these facts, and declared that
his Majesty had demanded satisfaction from the Court of Spain for the
insult to our flag and for the usurpation of our settlement; but that
considerable armaments were making in the ports of Spain. He called
upon the House to address his Majesty, imploring him to take all
necessary measures for the vindication of our honour and our rights.
Fox naturally expressed his surprise at this announcement, after the
high assurances of such profound prospects of peace little more than a
fortnight before. He moreover asserted that not only were the Ministers
fully aware of all these circumstances at the very moment when the
Premier made these statements, but that he had himself been aware of
them a considerable time before that. Pitt endeavoured to explain that
all the circumstances were not known when he professed such confidence
in peace; but these assertions were clearly as little true as the
former, for the British Government had received information from
the Spanish Government itself, as early as the 10th of the previous
February. Notwithstanding, the House supported the Government warmly
in its determination to resist the enormous claims of Spain and to
compel her to make satisfaction. Lord Howe was desired to have a fleet
in readiness, and the Spanish Court having taken a high tone to Mr.
Merry, our Minister at Madrid, Mr. Fitzherbert was dispatched thither
as our plenipotentiary. He arrived at Madrid in the beginning of June.
At first the Spanish Court were very high, and applied to France for
co-operation, according to treaty; but France, in the throes of the
Revolution, had no money to spend in such armaments and, on second
thoughts, Spain dreaded introducing French revolutionary sailors
amongst their own. They soon, therefore, lowered their tone, agreed to
surrender Nootka Sound, make full compensation for all damages, and
consented that British subjects should continue their fisheries in the
South Seas, and make settlements on any coasts not already occupied.
Captain Vancouver, who had been with Cook as a midshipman in his
last two voyages, being present at his tragical death, was sent out
in the following year to see that the settlement of Nootka Sound was
duly surrendered to England. He saw this done, the Spanish commander,
Quadra, behaving in a very friendly manner; and he proceeded then,
during the years 1792 and 1793, to make many accurate surveys of the
western coasts of North and South America, in which the Spaniards gave
him every assistance. The British took formal possession not only of
Nootka Sound, but of the fine island called after Vancouver. Pitt was
highly complimented for his firmness and ability in the management of
this business.
Wilberforce, on the 27th of January, had obtained a committee of
inquiry into the slave trade. He, Clarkson, and the anti-slavery
committees, both in London and the provinces, were labouring with
indefatigable industry in collecting and diffusing information on
this subject. The Committee of the Commons found strong opposition
even in the House, and, on the 23rd of April, Lord Penrhyn moved that
no further evidence should be heard by the Committee; but this was
overruled, and the hearing of evidence continued through the Session,
though no further debate took place on the question.
In Ireland, the influence of the free notions of France was already
become broadly manifest, and though it resulted in no unconstitutional
act, it wonderfully invigorated the resentment of the Irish against
corruptions of Government. These truly demanded reprehension and
reform; but the Government of Pitt was strong, and set both Ireland and
reform at defiance. The Marquis of Buckingham, the Lord-Lieutenant,
was recalled, because he had not been able to repress the movement in
the Irish Parliament on the Regency question. The Earl of Westmoreland
was sent in his place; but the Parliament still showed its resentment
as strongly as ever, and proceeded to delve vigorously into the sink
of Government corruption, and demand numerous corrections of abuses.
Direct motions on the subject were made in both Houses; in the Peers
by Lord Portarlington, in the Commons by Grattan, and, in truth,
the ministerial abuses of the Irish Government were disgraceful.
Grattan, on the 1st of February, pointed out the increased number of
commissioners of revenue, and moved that his Majesty be addressed to
inquire by whose advice this had been done. Next the increase of the
Pension List came under discussion; then the granting of no less than
fourteen Government offices to members of the Irish Commons. Lastly
was noticed the paltry withdrawal of Lord Strangford's pension of
four hundred pounds, which had been granted him at the request of the
Irish House of Lords, in consequence of his small income, because he
had voted against Ministers on the Regency Bill, at the same time that
numbers of men who were not Irishmen, and had never done anything for
Ireland or any other country, were saddled on the Irish revenue in a
variety of sinecure posts and pensions. All these motions, however,
were rejected by large Ministerial majorities.
[Illustration: CAPTAIN COOK.
(_After the Portrait by Dance, in Greenwich Hospital._)]
Before returning to the progress of the French Revolution, we must pass
a hasty glance over the affairs of the Netherlands and the north of
Europe. On the accession of Leopold, the brother of Joseph, a sweeping
change was made in Austrian policy. Leopold had ruled his dominions,
as Grand Duke of Tuscany, with remarkable wisdom and benevolence. He
had introduced many admirable reforms, and had abolished the punishment
of death--a grand example to the other nations of Europe, and proved
to be as sound as it was striking by its results. He now made haste to
assure the Netherlanders that all their grievances should be redressed,
and their old charters and constitution restored. There had always
been a considerable party in favour of the Imperial Government, and
this party was now greatly increased by these wise assurances, which
were relied on from the known magnanimous character of the Emperor.
A Congress met at Reichenbach to endeavour to make a peace between
Austria and the Sultan, and this was accomplished by the mediation of
Britain, Prussia, and Holland, backed up by the threat of an immediate
invasion by Prussia, which was instigated by Pitt. The Ministers of
the three Powers that had brought about this peace of Reichenbach,
next guaranteed to Leopold all the possessions of Austria in the
Netherlands, on condition that he should restore all the ancient
privileges and constitution. On the other hand, the democratic party
had a congress of the United Belgic States, and this congress, infected
by the French Republican principles, declared still for independence,
in which they were at first encouraged by the democrats in France.
Lafayette reverted to the idea of a republic in the Netherlands, which
should form a barrier between Austria and France, in case that Austria
should attempt to invade France and crush the Revolution, as appeared
probable. Dumouriez was sent to Brussels to inquire into the real
state of the Netherlands, as the Belgians had sent deputies to Paris
to make certain overtures. The result of Dumouriez's inquiries was so
extremely unfavourable that the French Government gave up all idea
of meddling in Netherland affairs. To Dumouriez, Van der Noot, the
leader of the revolutionary party, appeared a regular adventurer and
impostor, the people to be ignorant and bigoted; and the army, though
full of courage, yet destitute of good officers, money, clothing,
and discipline. Dumouriez, therefore, shrewdly concluded that France
had better make no present engagements with the Belgian reformers,
but leave the destinies of the country to be decided by the Congress
at Reichenbach, where the British, Dutch, and Prussian Ministers
had guaranteed the restoration of the government to Leopold, on the
renewal of the ancient institutions. Here again Pitt's foreign policy
was completely successful. Leopold easily crushed the rebellion,
and, having crushed it, proceeded to carry out the conditions of the
Convention of Reichenbach.
The Pitt Ministry figured with less success as regarded the
encroachments of Russia on the Turkish empire. The undisguised policy
of Catherine was to press on her operations against Turkey till she
had planted herself in Constantinople. Pitt continued as inactive as
if there were no danger at all, and the same policy actuated Holland
and Prussia. The least support given by these Powers to Gustavus of
Sweden would have effectually checked the Russian designs in the East,
and have raised Sweden into a position capable of acting as a dead
weight on Russian aggression. By very little aid Gustavus would have
been able to recover all the territories on the eastern side of the
Baltic which had been wrested from Sweden by Russia, and would thus
have kept a formidable power always, as it were, at the very gates of
St. Petersburg. But Gustavus was left, with his brave heart but limited
forces, to contend with Russia alone. He kept down his disaffected
nobles by cultivating the interests of the people at large, and
maintained a determined struggle with Russia. He sent over the Prince
of Anhalt with a small army of about three thousand men at so early a
season that the ground was covered with ice and snow. The prince pushed
on boldly towards St. Petersburg, and made himself master of the strong
forts and defences at Karnomkoski, on the Lake Saima, within two days'
march of that capital. In April they were encountered by ten thousand
Russians under the command of General Ingelstrom, whom they defeated
after a desperate battle, leaving two thousand Russians dead on the
field. But the Prince of Anhalt was killed, and the Swedes were not
able, with a handful of men, to advance on St. Petersburg, which was in
fearful panic. Gustavus was more successful at sea. He and his brother,
the Duke of Sudermania, fought the Russians with a very inferior force
of ships off Revel, and afterwards off Svenskasund. A considerable
number of English officers were serving in the Swedish fleet, amongst
them one destined to rise to high distinction, Sidney, afterwards Sir
Sidney, Smith. After two days' sanguinary fight at the latter place,
Gustavus beat the Russian Admiral Chitschakoff so completely that he
took four thousand prisoners, destroyed several of the largest Russian
ships, and took or sank forty-five galleys. Catherine was now glad
to make peace, which was concluded at Warela, near the river Kymen,
but with very different results to what would have been obtained had
Gustavus found that support which it was the obvious interest of the
whole civilised world to afford him. He agreed that each Power should
retain what it possessed before the war, thus conferring on Russia
the provinces torn from Sweden. Gustavus complained bitterly of his
treatment, and with ample cause.
During this campaign Catherine had made great progress in her road
to Constantinople. Suvaroff had reduced Ismail, a remarkably strong
place, which was the key of the lower Danube and the only obstruction
of any importance to the Russian advance to the Balkan mountains and
to Constantinople. This city had been taken by storm, after a most
desperate defence, on the 25th of December, and when, with a little
more resistance, the Russians would have been compelled to quit the
field by the severity of the season. The carnage on this occasion
was of the most frightful kind. The Russians themselves lost nearly
ten thousand men, and the Turks thirty thousand people--men, women,
and children, who were indiscriminately butchered by the orders of
Suvaroff, who said to his soldiers, "Brothers, no quarter to-day, for
bread is scarce." Every horror possible in war, especially between
barbarians, was perpetrated by the Russian hordes in Ismail, who
were guilty of the most diabolical atrocities, such as burning whole
streets, mosques, and serais. Suvaroff sat down and wrote in Russian
rhyme the words quoted by Lord Byron in "Don Juan," "Glory to God and
the Empress, Ismail is ours." When Sir Charles Whitworth, the British
ambassador, next saw Catherine, she said, in allusion to some strong
remonstrances from Britain and Prussia, which took care not to go
beyond remonstrances, which were cheap--"Since the king, your master,
wishes to drive me out of Petersburg I hope he will permit me to retire
to Constantinople." The Czarina Catherine still continued her war
on the Ottoman empire. The Turks gained several advantages over the
Russians on the shores of the Black Sea, and near the Danube, but they
were severely repulsed in an attempt to drive the Russians from their
conquests between the Black and Caspian Seas, and suffered a terrible
slaughter on the banks of the River Kuban. Then Britain, Prussia,
Holland, and Austria, from the Congress of Reichenbach, announced to
Catherine that they were resolved not to permit further encroachments
on Turkey, but Catherine paid not the slightest attention to their
remonstrances.
A fresh war had broken out with us in India. Tippoo Sahib had resumed
hostilities. He conceived the idea of obtaining the aid of an army
from France, and of thus driving us, according to his vow, entirely
out of India. He opened communications with M. du Fresne, the Governor
of Pondicherry, which Britain had very imprudently restored to France
at the peace after the American war. M. Leger, civil administrator in
England, brought Tippoo's proposals to Paris. Louis replied to the
proposal that the matter too keenly reminded him of the endeavour to
destroy the power of Britain in America, in which advantage had been
taken of his youth, and which he should never cease to regret. He had
learned too deeply the severe retribution which the propagation of
Republicanism had brought upon him. But, without waiting the arrival
of the hoped-for French troops, Tippoo had broken into the territories
of the British ally, the Rajah of Travancore, and by the end of 1789
had nearly overrun them. Lieutenant-Colonel Floyd, suddenly attacked
by Tippoo with an overwhelming force, had been compelled to retire
before him, with severe losses amongst his sepoys. But General Medows
advanced from Trichinopoly with fifteen thousand men, and following
nearly the route so splendidly opened up by Colonel Fullarton, took
several fortresses. Tippoo retreated to his capital, Seringapatam; but
there he again threatened Madras; and General Medows was compelled to
make a hasty countermarch to prevent that catastrophe. In the meantime,
General Abercrombie landed at Tellicherry with seven thousand five
hundred men from the presidency of Bombay; took from the Mysoreans all
the places which they had gained on the Malabar coast; restored the
Hindoo Rajahs, who, in turn, helped him to expel the forces of Tippoo
from the territories of the Rajah of Travancore, who was completely
re-established. This was the result of the war up to the end of the
year 1790; but Tippoo still menaced fresh aggressions.
The new British Parliament met on November 26, and Ministers were seen
to have a powerful majority. The king announced, in his speech from the
throne, that hostilities had broken out in India with Tippoo, and that
a peace had been effected between Russia and Sweden, and he mentioned
the endeavours that were in progress for restoring amity between the
Emperor of Austria and his subjects in the Netherlands. In the debate
on the Address in the Commons, Fox appeared inclined still to laud
France, and to condemn our interference in the Netherlands. His eyes
were not yet opened to the real danger from France, whose example was
indeed exciting popular disturbances in the Netherlands and in Poland.
Already the doctrines of Liberty and Equality had reached the ears of
the negroes in St. Domingo, who had risen to claim the rights of man so
amiably proclaimed by France, and the troops of France were on their
way thither to endeavour to put them down, in direct contradiction of
their own boasted political philosophy. In the Lords, Earl Grey--the
father of the Whig statesman--on the 13th of December, called for
the production of papers relating to Nootka Sound. The motion was
negatived by two hundred and fifty-eight against one hundred and
thirty-four votes. But the Marquis of Lansdowne contended that Spain
had a right to the whole of the North American coast on which Nootka
Sound is situated, and had had it since the reign of Queen Elizabeth.
He asserted that we had insulted the weakness of Spain; and that Mr.
Mears and the other projectors of the trading settlement of Nootka
Sound were a set of young men of letters, seeking for novelties. He
completely overlooked the provocations which Spain had lately given
us, and her endeavours to enter into a conjunction with France against
us. He condemned Ministers for having alienated France, Spain, Russia,
Denmark, and Sweden, overlooking the fact that they had made alliances
with Prussia, Austria, Holland, and the Netherlands. Pitt's cousin,
Lord Grenville, replied to this one-sided view of things, and proudly
contrasted the position of Britain at this moment to what it was at the
conclusion of the American War, when Lord Lansdowne himself, as Lord
Shelburne, had been in the Ministry. Pitt, on the 15th of December,
stated that the expenses of the late armament, and the sums necessary
to keep up the increased number of soldiers and sailors for another
year, before which they could not be well disbanded, owing to certain
aspects of things abroad, would amount to something more than three
millions, which he proposed to raise by increasing the taxes on sugar,
on British and foreign spirits, malt, and game licences, as well as
raising the assessed taxes, except the commutation and land taxes.
He stated that there was a standing balance of six hundred thousand
pounds to the credit of the Government in the Bank of England, which
he proposed to appropriate to the discharge of part of the amount.
He, moreover, introduced a variety of regulations to check the frauds
practised in the taxes upon receipts and bills of exchange, which he
calculated at three hundred thousand pounds per annum. With this,
Parliament adjourned for the Christmas recess, and thus closed the
eventful year of 1790.
The Parliamentary Session of 1791 was opened, after the Christmas
recess, by Sir Philip Francis denouncing the war against Tippoo Sahib
in India, and eulogising that prince. He moved thirteen resolutions
condemnatory of the war; but they were all rejected, and Dundas, as
head of the Board of Control, moved three counter-resolutions declaring
that Tippoo had voluntarily broken the treaty made with him in 1784,
and that faith must be kept with the Rajah of Travancore, whom he
had attacked, as well as with the Nizam and the Mahrattas, and these
resolutions were carried without a division.
The British Ministry was at length becoming aware of the mischief of
allowing the Empress of Russia to make continual inroads on the Turkish
Empire. The British Ambassador, Mr. Fawkener, had been instructed to
inform Catherine that Britain could not quietly acquiesce in these
usurpations, which were seriously disturbing the balance of power in
Europe. Catherine replied, haughtily, that she did not recognise the
right of Britain to interfere, and that she should keep possession
of Oczakoff, and all her conquests between the Bug and the Dniester.
On the 28th of March Pitt communicated this answer to the House, in
a message from his Majesty, and that he had deemed it necessary to
come to an understanding with his allies, Prussia and Austria, on
the subject, and to maintain the fleet in its augmented condition.
He moved, the next day, an address to his Majesty, thanking him for
his care in these respects. The Whigs, almost to a man, condemned
this policy. Coke of Norfolk, Lord Wycombe, Mr. Lambton, afterwards
Earl of Durham, and others, stoutly opposed it. Fox treated the idea
of Russia having become a power formidable to the peace of Europe
as ludicrous. Both he and Burke contended that there was nothing in
the aggressions of Russia to occasion any alarm; that Turkey was a
decaying nation, which it was useless to attempt to support; and that
to bolster it up was only to maintain a barbarous people in domination
over Christian populations. Fox upbraided the Government with their
folly and inconsistency, if such were their fears of Russia, in having
till recently encouraged her in her plan of aggressions in that
direction. He reminded them that, twenty years ago, Great Britain, on
war breaking out between Russia and the Porte, had aided Catherine
in sending a fleet to the Mediterranean, and had thus enabled her to
acquire a maritime force in the Black Sea. The truth, however, was that
it was not the present Ministry that had committed this folly, but a
Whig Ministry, of which Fox was one. He confessed to this, and also
to the fact that in 1782, when Catherine seized more completely on
the Crimea and Kuban Tartary, France and Spain had urged us to unite
with them in preventing this, but that we had declined, and these
countries had become permanently united to Russia. Now all this was,
in truth, a simple confession of the incapacity of the Whigs, and of
Fox himself included, to see the dangerous tendency of the Russian
policy, and the only circumstance on which he could justly condemn the
Ministry of Pitt was for not strenuously supporting Turkey and Sweden,
the ally of Turkey against Russia, when they did see this tendency.
By mean and parsimonious conduct they had allowed Sweden to be driven
out of her territories on the eastern shore of the Baltic by Russia,
when, had they given her but moderate support, that Power would have
become a permanent check on the aggressive spirit of Russia. The motion
of Pitt was carried by a large majority. A few days afterwards Mr.
Grey renewed the subject in a series of resolutions, condemning all
interference on behalf of Turkey, and contending that Russia was only
weakening instead of strengthening herself by extending her dominions.
But Pitt, in reply, showed the very obvious facts that the retention
of Oczakoff opened the way to Constantinople, and that the possession
of Constantinople prepared the way for the seizure of Egypt, and the
supremacy of the Mediterranean, with the most formidable consequences
to our commerce. The resolutions of Grey were negatived; but twice
again during the session the Whigs returned to the charge--on the 15th
of April and on the 25th of May,--but with no better success. The
armament was maintained, but the isolated threats of England had little
effect on Catherine. Pitt was accordingly compelled to change his
policy, and acquiesce in a peace by which she retained the territory
between the Bug and the Dniester, and the fortress of Oczakoff.
[Illustration: SCENE IN THE HOUSE OF COMMONS: BREACH BETWEEN BURKE AND
FOX. (_See p._ 379.)]
On the opening of the Session, the king called the attention of
Parliament to the state of Canada. That colony had flourished since it
had come into the possession of Britain, especially since the passing
of the Bill of 1774, which had given freedom to the Roman Catholic
church there, the church of the French inhabitants. But one part of
the colony was still inhabited by the descendants of the French, and
another by those of the English and Americans. It was, therefore,
found desirable to put an end to the competition which still existed,
from differences of faith and of national sentiments and customs,
between the two races, by dividing the colony into two provinces, the
one inhabited by the French to be called Lower Canada, and the other,
inhabited by the British, to be called Upper Canada. On the 25th of
February the king sent a message to Parliament, proposing to carry out
this division; and on the 4th of March Pitt moved to bring in a Bill
for that purpose, and stated the intended plan of arrangement. Besides
an elective assembly, each province was to have a Council, the members
of which were to be appointed for life, with hereditary succession to
the descendants of such as should be honoured with hereditary titles,
which titles were to confer on an inhabitant of either province the
dignity of a member of the Council. Landed property was to be held
according to English law, in soccage tenure; the Habeas Corpus was to
be established in both provinces. An allotment of lands was to be made
for the Protestant clergy; but, as the majority of the inhabitants
in the Lower Province would be Catholic, the Council and Assembly
were empowered to allot lands also to their clergy, which allotment,
on sanction of the Crown, was to be valid without intervention of
Parliament. No taxes were to be imposed by the British Government
except such as were necessary for the regulation of commerce, and
these were to be levied by the provincial legislature to prevent any
heartburnings like those which had occurred in the American States.
This Bill made it obvious that a great light had broken on the
British Government from the American Revolution; it was discovered
that the best way to govern and retain our colonies was to allow
them to govern themselves. This knowledge was worth all the loss and
annoyance of the American Revolution. Fox expressed his approbation
of the principle, and all appeared favourable to the passing of the
measure. It was allowed to proceed without opposition through its
first and second reading, and through the committee; but when it was
reported, then came a scene of violent contention, arising not so much
from the Bill itself as from the state of parties, and the making a
peg of this question on which to hang the conflicting opinions of
different members on a very different question--that of the French
Revolution. Not only had Fox and Burke and Sheridan broken up their
old friendship on this question, Sheridan being as enthusiastic about
the Revolution as Fox, but it had split up the whole Whig party. Burke
had published his eloquent "Reflections on the French Revolution," and
subsequently, in February of this year, a "Letter to a Member of the
National Assembly," in which he had repeated and extended his opinions
upon it. The Duke of Portland and Mr. Windham took Burke's view of
the nature of the French principles. However, it was not merely in
Parliament, but also throughout the country that opinions were divided
on the subject. Societies were formed to recommend the introduction of
French Revolutionary principles into Great Britain, and many eminent
men, especially among the Dissenters, took the lead in them, as we
shall presently see. The tendency to despotic government in Britain,
and a spreading conviction that Parliament was not truly elected by
the people, rendered large numbers favourable to these views. In
Parliament, however, the great shock of battle took place between the
so long united friends and fellow-labourers in reform, Fox and Burke,
and because the Canada Bill affected a French people, it was thought a
proper occasion by these statesmen to indulge in a lengthy and violent
discussion of their clashing views, in which the proper question before
Parliament, the Quebec Bill, was soon lost sight of.
On the motion for taking this Bill into further consideration, on the
8th of April, Mr. Hussey presented various petitions from merchants
regarding the measure, and moved that the Bill required recommittal. He
was seconded by Fox, who now, though approving of the main principles
of the Bill, took occasion to contend for the development of the
advanced doctrines of political liberty inculcated by the French
revolutionists, and to urge the insertion of clauses in the Bill, in
accordance with them. When the day for the debate on the Bill arrived,
Fox called on Burke, though he had not done so for some time, and,
in the presence of a common friend, entered into explanations which
appeared satisfactory. Fox then proposed that the answer of Burke
should not take place on the discussion of the Quebec Bill, though this
was the Bill on which this topic had been introduced. Burke refused
to comply; but the two old friends walked to the House together,
displaying the last show of friendship which was to take place between
them. Accordingly, on the 6th of May, when the chairman of the
Committee put the question, that the Quebec Bill be read paragraph by
paragraph, Burke rose, and determined to have a fair hearing on the
question of the French Revolution, and proceeded to inveigh strongly
against it. Then there were loud cries of "Order!" and "Question!"
and Mr. Baker declared that the argument of Mr. Burke was calculated
to involve the House in unnecessary altercation, and perhaps with the
Government of another nation. Fox said his right honourable friend
could scarcely be said to be out of order, for it seemed to be a day of
privilege, when any gentleman might stand up and take any topic, and
abuse any Government, whether it had reference to the point in question
or not; that not a word had been said of the French Revolution, yet
he had risen and abused it. He might just as well have abused that
of China or Hindostan. This taunt came with ill grace from Fox, who
had himself introduced this extraneous topic into the debates on this
very Bill, and seized that occasion to attack Burke's opinions in his
absence.
Burke proceeded amidst constant interruption to review the many scenes
and debates in which Fox and himself had acted, as well as those on
which they had differed, especially their difference of opinion on
the Royal Marriage Act; but no difference of opinion had ever before
affected their friendship. He alluded to his own long services and his
grey hairs, and said that it was certainly an indiscretion, at his
time of life, to provoke enemies, or induce his friends to desert him;
but that, if his firm and steady adherence to the British Constitution
placed him in that dilemma, he would risk all, and, as public
duty required, with his last breath exclaim, "Fly from the French
Constitution!" Here Fox whispered that there was no loss of friends;
that there could be no loss of friendship between them; but Burke
said--"Yes, there was a loss of friends: he knew the penalty of his
conduct; he had done his duty at the price of his friends--there was an
end of their friendship." It was some time before Fox could answer; he
was completely overcome by his emotion; and it was only after a free
flow of tears that he could proceed. He then said: "Painful as it was
to listen to such sentiments as those just delivered by one to whom
he owed so many obligations, he could never forget that, when little
more than a boy, he had been in the habit of receiving instructions
and favours from his right honourable friend. Their friendship had
grown with their life; it had continued for upwards of five-and-twenty
years; and he hoped, notwithstanding what had happened that day, that
his right honourable friend would think on past times, and would give
him credit for not intending anything unkind. It was quite true that
they had before now differed on many subjects, without lessening their
friendship, and why should they not now differ on the French Revolution
without a severance of friendship? He could not help feeling that the
conduct of his right honourable friend tended to fix upon him the
charge of Republican principles, whereas he was far from entertaining
such principles. His friend had heaped very ignominious terms upon him
that day." Here Burke said aloud, he did not recollect having used such
terms; and Fox promptly observed that "if his friend did not recollect
those epithets--if they are out of his mind, then they were for ever
out of his mind, too; they were obliterated and forgotten." He then
denied that there was any marshalling of a party on this subject; that
not one gentleman who had risen to call his right honourable friend to
order had done it by his desire; on the contrary, he had entreated his
friends not to interrupt him. After again dwelling for some time on the
merits of the French Revolution, he once more lamented the breach in
the unanimity of his friend and himself, and said he would keep out
of the way of his right honourable friend till he had time to reflect
and think differently, and that their common friends might bring them
together again; that he would endeavour to discuss the question on
some future day, with all calmness, if his friend wished, but for the
present he had said all that he desired to say.
With this debate terminated the friendship of Fox and Burke. Fox
disclaimed any premeditated attack on Burke, but the severe things
which he himself had said of his old friend, the contempt which he
expressed for Burke's "Reflections on the French Revolution," and
the private conversations which he invariably dragged into these
public debates, give us less confidence in this assertion; whilst the
co-operation of his party with him bore all the marks of a systematic
assault. On the one side stood Fox, expressing much feeling and regret,
but uttering the most cutting things, taunting Burke with his age and
his enthusiastic temperament, and backed by a violent and insulting
crew; on the other side stood Burke, deserted by those, and they
were numerous, who thought entirely with him. Not a few expressed to
Burke, in private, their agreement of opinion and admiration of his
conduct; but to make this expression of any value it should have been
open and bold. As it was, the great master who had taught the whole
generation of politicians their principles, was left to stand alone
in the conflict. He sustained his part nobly, and time was not long
in justifying his accuracy of calculation and his prescience. All the
results, however, which he declared inevitable, were already rushing
into open day, and the enamoured lovers of the French Revolution were
forced to hang their heads. In the meantime, the newspapers had poured
on the head of Burke their vials of abuse. On the very day on which
the Quebec debates terminated, the _Morning Chronicle_, the organ of
the Whigs, published this paragraph:--"The great and firm body of
the Whigs of England, true to their principles, have decided on the
dispute between Mr. Fox and Mr. Burke; and the former is declared to
have maintained the pure doctrines by which they are bound together,
and upon which they have invariably acted. The consequence is that
Mr. Burke retires from Parliament." They were not contented with this
premature announcement; they charged him with corruption and apostacy,
and described his life, one of honour and generosity, as a long series
of basenesses.
Whilst these violent dissensions had sprung up from the French
Revolution, Wilberforce and his coadjutors had been active in their
exertions to abolish the Slave Trade. Thomas Clarkson, now devoted
heart and soul to this object, was, with Dr. Dickson, sent out by the
parent Anti-Slavery Society through the country, to call into life
provincial societies and committees, and found themselves zealously
supported and warmly welcomed by philanthropists, and especially by
the Society of Friends. They circulated the evidence taken before
the House of Commons' Committee, and made a great impression. On
the other hand, the French Revolution proved as antagonistic to the
cause of the abolitionists as it had to the friendship of Burke and
Fox. The dreadful insurrection in St. Domingo was attributed to the
formation of the Society in Paris of _Les Amis des Noirs_, and many
otherwise enlightened men took the alarm, lest similar scenes in our
West Indian colonies should be the result of the doctrines of the
abolitionists. Few persons could be found willing to entertain the
idea of immediate abolition of the trade in slaves; and even Dr. Parr,
though a great Whig and adherent of Fox, declared that these Utopian
schemes of liberty to blacks were alarming to serious men. Wilberforce
was earnestly entreated to reconsider his plan; he was assured that
immediate abolition would not pass the Commons, nor even gradual
abolition the Lords. Wilberforce, however, could not be deterred from
bringing on the question. On the 18th of April he moved for leave to
bring in a Bill to prevent the introduction of any more slaves into our
colonies. Besides showing the cruelties practised in the collection
and transmission of negroes, he brought forward evidence to prove
that, so far from this trade being, as had been represented before the
Committee of the Commons, the nursery of British seamen, it was their
grave. He showed that of twelve thousand two hundred and sixty-three
men employed in it, two thousand six hundred and forty-five had been
lost in twelve months. This was calculated to produce far less effect
than the surrender of hundreds of thousands of negroes, inasmuch as
profit and loss was a more telling argument with the slave traders
than mere humanity; and they exerted all their influence in defence of
their traffic. Wilberforce added that even had this trade really been
a beneficial one as regarded mere political economy, there was a smell
of blood about it that all the perfumes of Arabia could not disguise.
He was ably supported by Fox and Pitt; but, on this occasion, the Prime
Minister could not command his large majority; the motion was lost by
one hundred and sixty-three against eighty-eight.
[Illustration: WILLIAM WILBERFORCE. (_After the Portrait by G.
Richmond._)]
During the Session, however, a Bill was passed sanctioning the
establishment of a company which had been formed several years before,
for trading to the new settlement of Sierra Leone, on the coast of
Africa. In 1787 this settlement was begun by philanthropists, to show
that colonial productions could be obtained without the labour of
slaves, and to introduce civilisation into that continent through the
means of commerce carried on by educated blacks. In that year four
hundred and seventy negroes, then living in a state of destitution in
London, were removed to it. In 1790 their number was increased by one
thousand one hundred and ninety-eight other negroes from Nova Scotia,
who could not flourish in so severe a climate. Ten years after the
introduction of the blacks from Nova Scotia, five hundred and fifty
maroons were brought from Jamaica, and in 1819 a black regiment,
disbanded in the West Indies, was added. The capability of this
settlement for the production of cotton, coffee, sugar, etc., was fully
demonstrated; but no spot could have been selected more fatal to the
health of Europeans. It is a region of deep-sunk rivers and morasses,
which, in that sultry climate, are pregnant with death to the white man.
During this Session, also, an important Bill was passed for the relief
of Roman Catholics. The Bill was introduced by Mr. Mitford and seconded
by Mr. Windham. Mr. Mitford showed that the enactments still in force
against them occupied, by mere recital of their penalties, seventy
pages of "Burn's Ecclesiastical Law." Priests were still guilty of
high treason and liable to death for endeavouring to convert people
to the tenets they deemed essential to salvation; and the laity were
liable to heavy penalties for not going to church, and for hearing
Mass at their own chapels. The Bill was supported by Pitt and Fox, by
Lord Rawdon, by the Archbishop of Canterbury (Dr. Moore), and by Dr.
Horsley, Bishop of St. David's. It passed. By this Act all the severe
restrictions and penalties were removed from those Roman Catholics
who would comply with its requisitions, to appear at one of the
courts of Westminster, or at quarter sessions, and make and subscribe
a declaration that they professed the Roman Catholic religion, and
also an oath exactly similar to that required by the Statute of 1778.
On this declaration and oath being duly made, they were enabled to
profess and perform the offices of their religion, to keep schools,
to exercise parochial or other offices in person or by deputy, and
the ministers of that religion were exempt from serving on juries
and from parochial offices. Their congregations were protected from
disturbance; but their priests were restrained from officiating in
places consecrated to the burial of Protestants, and from wearing their
habits anywhere but in their own places of worship. They were also
restrained from establishing religious orders; and the endowment of
schools and colleges was still to be deemed unlawful. No person could
in future be summoned to take the Oath of Supremacy and the declaration
against Transubstantiation; nor were Roman Catholics who had qualified
removable from London and Westminster, or punishable for coming into
the presence or palace of the king or queen. They were no longer
obliged to register their names and estates, or enrol their deeds and
wills; and every Roman Catholic who had duly qualified might act as
barrister, attorney, or notary.
On the 20th of May Fox moved for a Grand Committee on courts of
justice, to inquire into some late decisions of the courts in cases of
libel. Thomas Erskine, the eloquent advocate, had lately, in the case
of the Dean of St. Asaph, delivered a most brilliant and effective
speech on the right of juries to decide both on fact and on law in such
cases, the duty of the judge being only to explain the law. Fox adopted
this doctrine of Erskine, and framed his speech in the most glowing
terms. He complained, however, that such was not the practice of the
courts, and he particularly animadverted on the custom and the doctrine
of Lord Mansfield on this subject. He observed that in murder, in
felony, in high treason, and in every other criminal indictment, it
was the admitted province of the jury to decide both on law and fact.
The practice in the case of libel was an anomaly, and clearly ought
not to be so. He said that the doctrine which he recommended was no
innovation; it had been asserted by John Lilburne, who, when prosecuted
for a libel under the Commonwealth, declared that the jury were the
real judges, and the judges themselves mere cyphers, so far as the
verdict was concerned; and Lilburne had been acquitted, in spite of
the judge and of the influence of Cromwell. He reviewed the doctrines
of the Stuarts regarding libel, and observed that these could not be
wrong then and right now. He contended that the late practice had been
a serious inroad on the liberty of the press, and noted the case of
the printer of the _Morning Herald_, who had been tried for merely
commenting strongly on the sending of an armament to Nootka Sound, and
on the conduct of Parliament in granting supplies for this purpose.
He had been condemned to a year's imprisonment and to stand in the
pillory. Pitt observed that he had always, since he had had a place in
the Ministry, condemned the use of the pillory, and that there could be
no difficulty in remitting that part of the sentence in this particular
case. He supported Fox's view of the law, and recommended him to bring
in two short Bills, instead of going into committee on the subject. Fox
followed this advice, and brought in two Bills--one to remove doubts
respecting the rights and functions of juries in criminal cases; and
the other to amend the Act of the 9th of Queen Anne for rendering the
proceedings upon writs of Mandamus and informations in the nature of
a Quo Warranto more speedy and effectual. The first Bill passed the
Commons on the 2nd of June, but was thrown out in the Lords, through
the influence of Chancellor Thurlow, who had never forgiven Pitt his
contempt of his conduct on the Regency question during the king's
malady. This defeated the object of Fox during this Session, but it
was carried in the next, and Lord Thurlow's opposition lost him his
position. The Great Seal was put into commission.
Meanwhile, the publication of Burke's "Reflections on the French
Revolution" had caused an immense sensation. It went through edition
after edition, and elicited a warm and wide response in hearts already
convinced of, or beginning to see, the real tendency of the French
outbreak. On the other hand, it greatly exasperated the ultra-admirers
of French republicanism, and produced a number of vindications of it
by men who, for the most part, were exceedingly bitter against Burke,
and denounced him as an apostate, a renegade, and a traitor to liberty.
Amongst the most conspicuous of those who took the field against Burke
in books were Sir James Mackintosh, Thomas Paine, Dr. Price, and Dr.
Priestley, the two latter of whom also made free use of the pulpit for
the propagation of their political ideas. Ladies also distinguished
themselves in this contest, such as Mary Wollstonecraft, and Mrs.
Macaulay, the historian.
Mackintosh, who was a young lawyer of excellent education, but yet
entirely unknown, this year published his "Vindiciæ Gallicæ," in reply
to Burke; but he did it with the behaviour of a gentleman, and evident
admiration of the genius and political services of the great man whom
he opposed. His book was immensely admired, and at once lifted him into
notice. But it was not long before he began to see the correctness of
Burke's views and prophecies as to the French Revolution, and he did
not shrink from avowing the change of his sentiments in the _Monthly
Review_ and in conversation. His talents and this alteration of his
views recommended him to the Ministers, and he was appointed by Pitt
and Loughborough a professor of Lincoln's Inn, where, in a course of
lectures on the Constitution of England, he exhibited himself as an
uncompromising censor of the doctrines he had approved in his "Vindiciæ
Gallicæ." For this he was classed, by the vehement worshippers of
French ideas, with Burke, as a venal turncoat. Mackintosh did not
content himself with recanting his opinions on this topic from the
platform and the press; he wrote directly to Burke, who was now fast
sinking under his labours and his disappointments, and expressed his
undisguised admiration of his sagacity as a politician, and of his
general principles and political philosophy. Burke invited him down to
Beaconsfield, where a closer view of the philosopher and orator greatly
increased his esteem and admiration of the man.
Paine, in his "Rights of Man," was far from restricting himself to the
courtesies of life in attacking Burke. He had been most hospitably
received by Burke on many occasions at his house, and had corresponded
with him, and must therefore have seen sufficient of him to know that,
though he might become extremely enthusiastic in his championship of
certain views, he could never become mean or dishonest. Yet Paine
did not hesitate to attribute to him the basest and most sordid
motives. He branded him as the vilest and most venal of apostates.
Paine had, in fact, become a monomaniac in Republicanism. He had been
engaged to the last in the American Revolution, and was now living in
Paris, and constantly attending the Jacobin club. He was hand-in-hand
with the most rabid of the Republicans, and was fast imbibing their
anti-Christian tenets. Paine fully believed that the French were
inaugurating something much finer than any millennium; that they
were going to establish the most delightful liberty, equality, and
fraternity, not simply throughout France but throughout the world.
Before the doctrines of the French clubbists and journalists, all
superstition, all despotism, all unkindness were to vanish from amongst
mankind, and a paradisiacal age of love and felicity was to commence.
To those who pointed to the blood and fury already too prominently
conspicuous in this business, he replied that these were but the dregs
of corrupt humanity, which were working off in the great fermentation,
and all would become clear and harmonious.
Amongst those who hailed enthusiastically the French Revolution, and
gave credit to its promises of benefit to humanity, were a considerable
number of the Dissenting body, and especially of the Unitarian class.
Amongst these, Drs. Price, Priestley, Kippis, and Towers were most
prominent. Dr. Price--who furnished Pitt with the theory of the Sinking
Fund, and with other propositions of reform,--on the breaking out
of the French Revolution was one of the first to respond to it with
acclamation. He was a member of the Revolution Society, and in 1789 he
preached before it a sermon on "The Love of our Country," and in this
drew so beautiful a picture of the coming happiness of man from the
French Revolution, that he declared that he was ready to exclaim with
Simeon, "Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, for mine
eyes have seen thy salvation." At the dinner on the same occasion he
moved that a congratulatory address be sent to the National Assembly on
that glorious event, which was seconded by Lord Stanhope the chairman,
and which was sent, and received with great acclamation by the National
Assembly. Burke, in his "Reflections on the French Revolution," was
very severe on Price, as well as on his coadjutors; and as Price died
this year it was said that the "Reflections" had killed him, which,
were it true, could not be said to have done it very prematurely, for
the doctor was in his seventieth year.
But far more remarkable were the effects of the championship of
French principles in the celebrated Dr. Joseph Priestley. Priestley
was now nearly sixty years of age--a time of life when men rarely
become great enthusiasts in any cause. He was a Unitarian minister,
and was now the pastor of a congregation at Birmingham. He was well
known for various theological writings, in which he had announced
his doubts of the immateriality of the sentient principle in man,
especially in his "Disquisition on Matter and Spirit." He had been
tutor to Lord Shelburne, first Lord Lansdowne; but had quitted that
post, as supposed, in consequence of the objection of Lord Shelburne
to these principles, retaining, however, an annuity of one hundred and
fifty pounds a-year. But Priestley was far more known and esteemed
for his researches and discoveries in natural philosophy, especially
in electricity, chemistry, and pneumatics. Orthodoxy and Toryism were
extremely rampant in Birmingham, and Priestley was regarded as the very
patriarch and champion of Socinianism and Republicanism. There wanted
only a spark to fire trains of fierce intolerance against Priestley
and his party, and, unfortunately, this was furnished by themselves.
They resolved to celebrate, by a dinner, the anniversary of the taking
of the Bastille, on the 14th of July. Before the dinner took place,
such were the rumours of impending riots that the party proposed to
defer the celebration to a future day; but the landlord had prepared
the dinner, and declared his opinion that there would be no danger
if the party dispersed early, without stopping to drink many toasts.
Darbley, the innkeeper, curiously enough, was a Churchman, and in good
odour with the Tory party. Satisfied by his representations, about
eighty persons determined to hold the dinner on the appointed day,
though a considerable number stayed away, and amongst those Priestley
himself. The company were hooted as they entered the inn, but chiefly
by a crowd of dirty lads, who cried "Church and King!" On the table
were ranged three figures: a medallion of the king encircled with
a glory, an emblematical figure of British Liberty, and another of
French Slavery bursting its chains. In the evening a fierce riot broke
out, instigated--according to Priestley's account--by some prominent
magistrates, though the statement was never proved. The mob rushed
to Darbley's hotel after the dinner was over and most of the people
were gone. There they raised the cry of "Church and King!" and began
to throw stones. Some one cried out, "Don't break Darbley's windows;
he is a Churchman!" But the Church-and-King people and their set,
now flushed with wine and loyalty, waved their handkerchiefs from
the windows of the opposite inn, and hurrahed the mob on. With this
encouragement, which seemed to the crowd to legalise their proceedings,
the mob rushed into the house, declaring that they wanted to knock
the powder out of Dr. Priestley's wig. They did not find the doctor,
so they smashed most of the furniture in the house, and dashed in the
windows, notwithstanding the host's orthodoxy. Some one then cried,
"You have done mischief enough here; go to the meetings!" and the mob
rolled away, first to the new meeting-house, where Priestley preached,
which they soon demolished and set fire to. They then proceeded to the
old meeting-house, and destroyed that too, being hounded on by people
of decent station in the place, and made furious by the beer which was
distributed among them.
This destruction accomplished, the mob marched away to the house of
Priestley, which was at Fair Hill, where they utterly burned and
destroyed all the invaluable library, philosophical instruments,
and manuscripts, containing notes of the doctor's further chemical
experiments and discoveries. Fire-engines were called out to prevent
the flames of the meeting-houses from spreading to the adjoining
houses, but they were not suffered to play on the meeting-houses
themselves, nor does any effort appear to have been made to save
Priestley's house. The doctor and his family had made a timely retreat.
He himself passed the first two nights in a post-chaise, and the two
succeeding on horseback, but less owing to his own apprehensions of
danger than to those of others. An eye-witness said that the high road
for fully half a mile from his house was strewed with books, and that,
on entering the library, there were not a dozen volumes on the shelves;
while the floor was covered several inches deep with torn manuscripts.
This was the work of the night of the 14th of July, and the riots
continued from Thursday to Sunday; among the buildings destroyed being
the paper warehouse of William Hutton, the historian of the place, and
the author of several antiquarian treatises. Hutton was a man who had
raised himself from the deepest poverty, for his father was a poor
stocking-weaver of Derby. He had found Birmingham without a paper
warehouse; had opened one, and, by that shrewdness and carefulness in
business, which are so conspicuous in his "Autobiography," and afford
a valuable study for young men, had acquired a competence. He was not
only an honour to the town by his upright character, and reputation
as a self-taught author, but he had been an active benefactor to it.
He had been the first to establish a circulating library in the town;
was always an advocate and co-operator in works and institutions of
improvement, and was the most active and able commissioner of the Court
of Requests. His only crime was that of being a Nonconformist, and an
advocate of advanced principles.
[Illustration: THE PRIESTLEY RIOTS AT BIRMINGHAM (_see p._ 384)]
During these disgraceful days the Church-and-King party took no
measures to prevent the destruction of the property of Dissenters.
Noblemen, gentlemen, and magistrates rode in from the country on
pretence of doing their duty, but they did little but sit and drink
their wine, and enjoy the mischief. They could have called out the
militia at once, and the mob would have been scattered like leaves
before the wind; but they preferred to report the outbreak to the
Secretary-at-War, and, after the time thus lost, three troops of
the 15th Light Dragoons, lying at Nottingham, were ordered to march
thither. But the arrival of the Light Dragoons showed what might have
been done at first if the magistrates had been so minded. The mob
did not stay even to look at the soldiers; at their very name they
vanished, and Birmingham, on Monday morning, was as quiet as a tomb.
Government itself took a most indifferent leisure in the matter. It
did not issue a proclamation from the Secretary of State's office till
the 29th, when it offered one hundred pounds for the discovery and
apprehension of one of the chief ringleaders.
At the ensuing assizes in August, those rioters who had been
apprehended were tried; some at Worcester for participating in the
outrages, but there only one prisoner was committed. Of those tried at
Warwick, on the 25th of the month, four received sentence of death.
Of these five rioters condemned, only three actually suffered, while
two received his Majesty's gracious pardon. The victims of this riot
thought the penalty much too trivial! Such, indeed, was the perverted
state of public feeling in and around Birmingham, that the sufferers
were regarded as men seeking the lives of innocent men who had only
shown their loyalty to Church and King. They were declared to be no
better than selfish murderers. Whilst they attended at the assizes,
their lives scarcely seemed safe. They were publicly abused in the
streets, or menaced and cursed wherever they appeared. In the very
assize-hall there were persons who, on seeing Priestley, cried, "Damn
him! there is the cause of all the mischief!" He was followed in the
streets, especially by an attorney, who cursed him furiously, and
wished he had been burned with his house and books. The favourite toast
of the Church-and-King party was, "May every Revolutionary dinner be
followed by a hot supper!" The damages awarded to the sufferers were,
in most cases, ludicrously inadequate. Hutton was a heavy loser;
Priestley received three thousand and ninety-eight pounds, but he
complained that this was two thousand pounds short of the extent of his
loss. But this deficiency was made up by sympathising friends.